Breathless
by holdeverysong
Summary: Aubrey, Sadie's friend that she met in London, was dying for a change. Sadie jumped on the chance to have her friend in town with her. Jamie/OFC, with mention of Sadie/Kwest, Jude/Tommy. I'll probably have to change the rating later on.
1. New Beginnings

As I stepped off the bus, I smiled and looked around. Yeah. This was definitely a million times better than any boring plain in Iowa. Smoothing a hand through my hair, I stepped out of the way and let the people getting off the bus behind me disperse around me and make their way to wherever it was they were going, but I just took a second and took everything in. People hurrying along the sidewalk to get from point A to point B, snow falling outside and traffic practically jammed bumper to bumper in an effort to get to wherever it was _they_ needed to go. Remind me again why I hadn't come here for good, a million years sooner?

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of the girl I'd met in London, Sadie Harrison, waving to me and smiling like she'd just won the lottery. I waved her over to me, grabbing my bags of clothes and necessities from the floor of the bus station. We'd met in London, as I'd said, two years ago. I'd gone there on my summer vacation in my junior year of high school to celebrate...well, surviving another year in nowhere, Iowa, met Sadie at a restaurant, and we'd clicked right away. We'd come to find that we'd been staying in the same hotel and spent the whole vacation seeing the sights together, just doing all the things girls did. And ever since, we'd called or emailed each other every day, and Sadie visited on vacations and time off. And when I mentioned wanting to get the hell out of Iowa, she told me quickly that I could come stay with she, her boyfriend Kwest and her sister, Jude—yes, _the_ Jude Harrison—in their parents' house in Toronto.

I thought it was strange that she just invited me to stay at their place after only meeting me once, but she had told me when I questioned that they'd had far shadier characters than me staying there time and time again, so the part of me that felt bad was rapidly replaced with gratitude.

Sadie got up to me, and I dropped my bags like I hadn't spent thirty seconds trying to gather them all up, throwing my arms around her neck as we shared an excited squeak. "Aubrey!" she beamed. "I'm so glad you're here!" she exclaimed as she released me from our embrace and grabbed a couple of my bags from the floor, helping me with the possibly fifty pound burden that I was carrying.

"Me too..." I smiled and took a breath, still taking in everything around me as we passed by. This was culture shock, but of the best possible kind. The moment I'd been waiting for...for essentially all my life. No more Iowa, and in a place with more than four hundred people, thank god. "Wow is this insane...the most traffic we get at home in Minburn is like, a sixteenth of this..." I chuckled and followed her as she led me out to her car.

With a laugh, Sadie opened the door and grabbed her keys from her pocket, pushing the button to unlock the trunk of her car. "Well, you've got a lot to get used to, my friend..." she told me. "Hey, Aub, I hope you don't mind coming to G Major with me...I have something I need to do for work; shouldn't be more than twenty minutes, if you don't mind just hanging around in the front..."

My grin that I'd been wearing since boarding the bus in Iowa somehow managed to get significantly wider and I shoved Sadie with my shoulder. "Hm, let's see...my first day in Toronto, hanging around at a major record label—no pun intended—in the same building as the people I listened to on my iPod on my way up here...I don't know, Sade," I pretended to think about it as I put my bags in the trunk and closed it after me.

"Well, in that case, I could just drop you back at my place where you could watch reruns on TV all day and wait impatiently for me to get home so we can go on a giant shopping spree..." Sadie crossed her arms, nodded her head soundly and sat in the driver's seat.

I cringed and stuck my tongue out in disgust as I followed her around the car and plopped down into the passenger's side seat. "You make a convincing argument, Harrison. The UN could have used a girl like you, you know..." I teased.

"Well, when you see G Major, you'll know why I needed to stay..." she laughed a little. "The UN may have needed me, but they needed me more..." she said, pulling into the bumper to bumper traffic and letting out an exasperated sigh as her cell phone rang, almost as though on cue. "See what I mean?" she asked as she flipped it open and continued toward the studio, leaving me to look around at everything as we passed by.

Coffee shops, clothing stores lined up right in a row, music stores, everything you could ever ask for, right in a row. You had to go almost fifty miles to get something like this in Iowa. I couldn't pull the smile off my face, that is, until Sadie flipped the phone closed, groaned loudly and seemingly deterred from her initial course down a side road. "...I take it that wasn't a very pleasant phone call..."

Sadie laughed and shook her head. "No phone call with Darius Mills is pleasant unless your name is Jude Harrison. And sometimes not even then..." she rolled her eyes.

"Well, you've got half of it, right?" I asked, trying to lighten things up a little bit. But the look on Sadie's face suggested that I...hadn't succeeded. Or even come close.

The grouchiness faded, though, and she let off a sympathetic smirk. "I'll let that one slide since you're new in town," she joked, "that and I have to crush your 'meeting the people on your iPod' dreams..." she sighed again. "I'm sorry, Aub...Darius gave me a big thumbs down on you visiting G Major today, since there's so much going on right now..."

I shrugged and smiled. "Not mad. I'm pretty sure nothing could bring me down right now..." I told her.

She smiled and turned onto a side road, now that we were out of town. I had never been to a place where the houses were so close together. I kind of liked it. "I knew I liked you for a reason. I hope you don't mind being home alone for a little while...with the reruns and the takeout, since neither Jude, Kwest or I will be home until, like, ten tonight, at the earliest..." she bit her lip.

"The downside to working for a major record label, huh?" I asked with a shrug. "Don't worry about me. If I get bored, I can just trash the house and run up the phone bill astronomically high...or take a walk around town...one of the two," I teased.

"Kwest cleans, and the phone is Jude's bill...so, by all means..." she smiled evilly as she pulled into the driveway, took the keys out of the ignition and walked around to the trunk with me.

I laughed and gave her the thumbs up. "I'll be sure I tell them that you said that..." I winked as I followed her around the vehicle.

She chuckled lightly and pulled the biggest bag out, setting it on the sidewalk beside the car. "I'll help you get these out of here but I hope you don't mind if I just drop and go or something...I'm in a serious rush..." she flashed me an apologetic look.

I shook my head and smiled sincerely at her. "Sadie, don't worry about it. We have all of tomorrow...and like, forever, to hang out so I'm not worried. Go do your busy work thing, and we can talk about stuff when you get home..." I smiled as I grabbed a couple of my bags and started backing toward the front door.

Sadie smiled gratefully and hurried back to the driver's side, waving goodbye to me over the top of the car and biting her lip. "Try not to have too much fun without me, huh?" she teased, then pulled away. And as she made her way down the road, I saw her pull her phone out and get frustrated again...such was the life of a woman working for a major record label, clearly.

I finished carrying the load of bags that I had to the front step and grabbed for the doorknob, turning it, then staring blankly at my hand. Locked? No way. I tried again and let out a frustrated grunt. Reaching into my pocket for my phone to call Sadie and ask her for a spare key...I was even more devastated to find that the battery was absolutely dead. So...stuck outside until ten p.m., at the earliest? And...it was two p.m. then. I had a...really long day ahead of me...


	2. Chemicals React

What I hadn't realized at the time was that it was freezing cold, and the snow had no intention of letting up. Sitting on the porch, freezing and trying to read the book I'd started on the bus, I shuddered a little and let my eyes turn skyward. Hugging my coat to me, because once a jacket became covered with enough snow, it sort of lost it's effectiveness, I ran a hand through my hair and let my head fall. So, basically, I was going to spend the first week or more of my time in Canada with pneumonia and it would take forever for me to even be able to look for work. Or even worse, I would become nothing but a Aubrey flavored popsicle. I was already well on my way, it seemed.

"You know you won't see anyone that lives at that house until at least ten, right?" I heard a slightly amused voice coming from the yard next door. "The latest I've seen someone slink up the driveway is like two in the morning, so if you're waiting for someone you might want to just go home..."

I turned and looked at them—him, I now saw, and chuckled a bit. "Well, I live here, now, too, so looks like the earliest you've seen someone coming up the driveway is two p.m.," I flashed him a slight smirk. Yeah, he was cute. Tall with dark brown, sort of shaggy hair, kind of pale and awkward looking, but really, really cute. "What are you, some kind of G Major stalker or something?" I asked him with a wink.

He laughed and shook his head no. "Hardly..." he leaned against the wall of the house he was standing next to, then gave me an up and down look. "So, you live here? I've never seen you even come to visit the Harrison's before..." he pointed out.

I raised an eyebrow at him and put my hair behind my ear. "That doesn't exactly support your theory that you're not a stalker," I teased, but decided to give him the courtesy of answering his question. "I'm Aubrey McDermott. I'm a friend of Sadie's...she invited me to stay here until I got on my feet..." I told him with a smile, watching carefully as he nodded in acknowledgement. "Okay so, you know that I'm not a psychotic, freaky, weirdo now...my turn..."

He smirked a little, and I had to admit, it was really kind of sexy. "Jamie Andrews..." he said, seeming to go into thought for a second. "I've been Jude's f—er, the Harrison's neighbor for years now..." he offered up as an explanation. And while, judging by the look on his face, I could see that wasn't the whole story, he didn't give me a chance to ask for anything else. Though from where he stopped, I could see that he and Jude were having trouble. "So, either you're certifiable and like being outside in subzero temperature and horrible snow or you don't have a front door key yet...and I'm assuming it's the latter..."

"Don't assume things, Jamie Andrews..." I gave him a playful smile, unmoving from my place on the front porch. I was almost sure that he wasn't going to offer to help me, anyway.

He returned my smile and shrugged a shoulder. "Oh, okay. And here I was about to invite you inside for some warmth and food, but clearly, if you're certifiable and like the cold, you don't need it, do you Aubrey McDermott?" he teased right back. Someone other than Sadie who could handle my sense of humor? I was beginning to think that Toronto was the best decision of my life.

I stood. "Well, I wouldn't say that..." I chuckled a little bit. "If you don't mind...a little warmth probably won't kill me..." I gave him a hopeful glance and hugged my coat a little tighter. "Sadie drove off before I had a chance to get the key from her..."

He stepped down from his front porch and smiled a little bit more. "Sure. My nana's making chicken stew for supper tonight, so that should help you warm up a bit..." he offered, grabbing up one of my suitcases from the floor of the porch. "Let's go..."

Another plus about being here in Toronto, people seemed a lot nicer. At least in this neighborhood. Not to mention far, far more attractive. I followed Jamie into his house and took a quick glance around, smiling and following Jamie to where he set my bags down in the corner. "Thanks...any longer and I probably would hand ended up with frostbite or something..."

"James is that you?" I heard the voice of an elderly woman coming from the other room. I remembered him mentioning something about his nana outside, so I figured that must have been her, and I smiled when I saw her face."Oh, hello there...I don't believe we've met..." she addressed me with a pleasant smile, which I returned.

I extended a hand to shake hers and smirked. "I'm Aubrey McDermott...I'm a friend of Sadie Harrison's. I just moved in with Sadie and Jude..." I told her with a small grin. "I hope it's no trouble that I'm here...I managed to find myself locked out, since I don't have a key yet..." I bit my lip. It was an embarrassing situation. My first day in town and here I was locked out of the house in a snowstorm.

"Oh dear...well it's nice to meet you, Aubrey...you can call me nana," she smiled softly. "Will you be staying for supper?"

Jamie nodded and looked at her. "Yeah, she will. If that's all right..." he looked out into the kitchen. "Do you need any help with anything, nana?"

She shook her head and smiled. "Why don't you show her around the house, James..." she offered and nodded toward a hallway leading a little farther into their place. I swear, I had stepped out of hell and into heaven.

Jamie nodded and started down the hall, beckoning me to follow. "The ground floor is nana's. But this is the bathroom if you need it during supper, this is nana's room, the spare room and the laundry room..." he shrugged them off, chuckling a little. "And then we go upstairs..." he started up the stairs. "The upstairs is mine..."

"Usually, I don't go into a guy's room until the second time I meet them, at least," I joked, watching as Jamie seemed to suddenly be having a kind of difficult time going up the stairs, tripping over either his foot or the next step up and practically face-planting. I stifled a laugh and smoothed a hand through my hair, biting my lip and looking at him as he tried to regain his bearings. "You okay?"

He cleared his throat, nodded his head and tried to shake it off. "Oh. Um, yeah, I'm all right..." he said, not looking at me right away, but in his reflection in the window, I could see that his face was almost as red as a tomato. He didn't acknowledge the comment I'd made; instead continued up the last couple steps and nodded at a door down the hall. "That's the bathroom...that's my room and this is the den..." he opened the door and let me go in first. "We can watch a movie, play a video game...anything...it's up to you..."

I smiled at him and shrugged. "What would you normally be doing right now?" I asked. I didn't want to mess with his everyday schedule or anything.

He chuckled. "Oh. I have a...sort of recording studio in the basement...I'd probably be tinkering down there with...the artists that I don't have..." he said with a laugh and a roll of his eyes.

"A studio?" I asked, eyes widening. Was everyone that Sadie knew musically inclined? Made me kind of feel left out.

Jamie went sort of coy and shrugged a shoulder. "It's...nothing really..."

I gave him a look. "I'll be the judge of that..." I told him somewhat sternly, but with a grin on my face to keep his spirit light. "Show me..."

"Okay, um, follow me..." he said, nodding out the door and brushing past me. His subtle, sort of awkward shyness was really attractive. The way he shied away from any touch right off the bat was even more so. Not only was he kind of a nerd (which wasn't a bad thing, really), but he was a cute, nice nerd. It seemed to me that there was absolutely no downside whatsoever to living in Toronto. At least not so far.

I followed him down the stairs, past the kitchen where the smell of the stew that his nana was making had started to radiate through the entire floor and it was making the fact that I hadn't eaten since before I'd gotten on the bus in Iowa even more prominent. But I didn't say anything, instead followed silently as Jamie opened up the door to the basement and showed me down the stairs.

Sure enough, it was set up like a music studio. Computers and mixers like the things Sadie had shown me in pictures from G Major, only on a much smaller scale. It looked far cozier than what I'd seen of the G Major studio, like something any artist would want to perform in, really. "I don't know what you're talking about Jamie. This is...really great. If I had any musical talent, I'd sign with you, just to get the chance to perform here..."

With a bit of a smile again, Jamie shrugged his shoulders and sat down in the chair in front of the computer, turning and looking at me. "Thanks...we have a couple potential signings in the works...but nothing concrete yet..." he told me, leaning back in the chair.

"I'm sure it wouldn't hurt G Major if you pilfered a couple of their artists, either..." I winked and took a seat on the couch, turning to face him with the same look on my face. I didn't know why I couldn't stop smiling around Jamie, but it seemed as though he brought out more smiles than anyone had in a long time. Even Sadie.

He laughed nervously. "Funny you should mention that..." he bit his lip.

"Oh?"

He nodded and ran a hand through his hair. "That...uh...stays between us, okay?" he showed me a pleading glance.

I nodded and gave him my best attempt at a comforting smile. "Secret's safe with me, Jamie."

He smirked, looked down at his shoes and then glanced up at me without really raising his head, so only his eyes were facing me. "So, what about you, Aubrey? What brings you up to Toronto?"

I shrugged a shoulder and made myself a little more comfortable. "I don't know. I was in desperate need of a change of scenery and a change of pace, so what better way to get it then moving from Iowa to Toronto?" I asked with a little smile.

"Iowa...wow, that is a change..." he blinked a couple times.

I laughed and nodded. "You're telling me. The town I used to live in had two hundred people in it in tourist season, so right now, I'm loving my life. I was made for the city, I decided awhile ago," I smiled, watching as his grin turned to a smile and feeling my heart flutter a bit...which was weird, because I was by no means a wishy washy girl. "So, Sadie offered my a place to stay and...yeah, I jumped on it."

Jamie laughed a little and crossed his arms, leaning forward a little bit. "I would have never thought of Sadie Harrison as the charitable type..." he quipped.

I laughed, because honestly, when I'd first met Sadie, I'd thought she was nothing but a blonde brat who lived for nothing but self indulgence. "There's a lot people don't know about her. But Kwest knows it all..." I added with a huge smirk.

He laughed again, and I caught the first real, good glimpse of the look on his face when he laughed...and the smile on my face grew even wider, to the point that it hurt a little. I had been about to say something to him when I heard his nana calling from upstairs, telling us that supper was ready. "Shall we?" Jamie asked with a small smile. And without hesitation, since I was so damn hungry I felt my stomach might implode, I stood and watched as he stood too, looking up at him and starting toward the stairs.


	3. Everything

"Wow...I'm totally thawed now..." I said with a smile as we made our way back up the stairs into Jamie's part of the house. "Your nana can cook a mean chicken stew, Jamie. That was really a perfect way to combat frostbite..." my eyes wandered up to look at Jamie and watched as he opened the door to the den. Six p.m., so we had only managed to kill a few hours? Though it had been nice to sit and talk with his nana at the dinner table. She reminded me a lot of my grandmother back in Iowa.

"Nana can cook basically anything...which is good, because I burn water..." he said with a smirk as he took a seat on the couch he had sitting in the middle of the den. "So, what did you want to do, watch a movie or...I don't know...I'll let you choose..." he said softly.

I looked around the room and my eyes fell upon his music collection. "Well, they say you can tell a lot about a person from their music collection, right?" I asked, reaching into my pocket and grabbing my iPod, tossing it over to him. "So, let's trade information here..."

He laughed a little and grabbed his from the table beside his couch. "Those are just collectible albums I've found in dollar bins here and there...this is the stuff I actually listen to..." he said shyly as he tossed his iPod over to me. I smirked as I turned it on and started scrolling through the list. Couldn't say the guy had bad taste in music or anything. He had everything from the essentials, like Blondie, the Clash and Black Flag, but he had newer stuff, too. Everything he had, I had on my iPod, too, and it made me think that...maybe, I'd managed to find someone like me in the world.

"Holy hell, you have almost ten days of music on here? That even manages to beat mine somehow..." he said with a laugh as he started scrolling through. "Lots and lots of Beatles music, huh? So, how does someone from Iowa amass such a huge music collection, anyway?" he asked, looking up from when he was scrolling through my music collection and handing my iPod back out to me.

I shrugged. "In Iowa? You either try and convince yourself that there's a world outside the boring or you become as flat as the plains..." I said with a smirk as I saw him catch the joke.

He laughed and flashed me a grin that could have probably floored me if I'd let it. "Poor deprived soul..."

I smirked back and saw his eyes raise to look at mine again. "I was! I'm telling you! My nearest neighbors were cows and they were a half mile away!" I scoffed at the fact that he was still grinning. "What?"

"Cows? Really?" he crossed his arms and laughed a bit more.

I nodded emphatically and pocketed my iPod. "Someday, when you're ever bored enough to go to Iowa, you're going to see how absolutely nothing it is and you're gonna think back to today and be like 'wow, Aubrey was right...'" I mocked him a little bit. "Just because you're lucky enough to be in the center of the action doesn't mean that everyone else is, there, Jamie..." I kept my voice light.

He chuckled a bit and put his iPod in his pocket. "I'll keep that in mind."

I laughed and accepted my iPod, offering his back out to him and taking a seat on the couch, a few feet away from him. "So, what are we going to do now?" I asked, taking a glance at the clock. We hadn't killed much time, skimming through each other's iPod playlists, I'd noticed, and I wondered if he was really going to want me around for that long. Poor guy. I was probably seriously cramping his style or something. Who needed an unwanted tag along hanging around all day? "I could just go try and find a spare key to the Harrison's place, if you want me out of your hair..."

Jamie smiled and shook his head. "No, you're fine..." he said, then looked outside. "Plus I don't think Jude and Sadie keep a spare key, for Jude's safety or something..." he explained, then turned to look at me. "But, we could go for a walk or something..." he suggested. "The snow has cleared up a lot and we could try and familiarize you with the area or something..."

I smiled and stood. "You, Jamie Andrews, know how to plan a perfectly good evening that should have been awesomely bad..." I said, offering a hand to pull him from his seat. "So, shall we go? My coat is downstairs and you probably need to tell your nana or something..." I smiled a bit wider. So, he suggested that we go for a walk? Maybe that meant that I wasn't an annoying appendage to him or something...and maybe he liked the company. I couldn't wipe the grin off my face as I pulled my jacket on.

"Yeah, nana, she might be back later...depending on how late we're out there..." he said with a smile as he grabbed his coat from the coat rack and put it on. And then it was back outside, into the frozen tundra of Toronto. "So, which way do you want to go first?"

I shrugged and started down the stairs, then headed to the end of the front walk. "You're the expert. What do you think will interest me?" I asked, though I hardly intended to sightsee. Unless you counted Jamie as one of the sights...which I most definitely did. "So, you said you've lived next door to the Harrison's forever now, huh?" I asked with a small smile.

"Yeah. Jude and I used to play concert in the backyard, but that was before I realized that you had to have musical talent to be a star..." he said with a laugh as he ran a hand through his hair, smoothing it back and moving some of the powdery snowflakes from it.

I grinned a little and followed his lead, but looked over at him and my face became a bit sadder as I saw that he was hardly smiling. "So, what happened between you and Jude anyway? I remember earlier, it sounded a little like you were going to say that you and Jude were friends, but you stopped yourself..." I said, thinking back to when he'd invited me in from the porch. He'd cut himself off pretty quickly.

"A lot happened. It can't be summed up quickly, aside from to say that she chose Tommy Q over me, twice, or, well, more like a million times, but twice when it counted..." he said sadly. "I'm sure, living with Jude and Sadie, you'll hear all about the Tommy-Jude-Jamie saga. And not to make myself sound like a constant victim here, but I always ended up on the outside looking in."

I nodded, because Sadie had told me a couple of times that no being, man or beast, could come between Jude and Tommy. "And, I'm just guessing here, you got tired of always playing second fiddle and told her off, more or less?" I asked him with a shrug.

"Sort of," he spoke sadly. It was strange that he was so willing to tell me all this on the first day we met, but it was sort of nice, too. "It was weird, because, Jude and I were always strong enough to face down anything like that, but I had more or less been led on for almost a month and a half. She was flirty and huggy and all that good stuff, but when it came time to choose..."

"She chose Tommy..." I shook my head. Jude always seemed like a smart girl, too. Though, with the looks that Jamie and I were exchanging right then, I sort of wanted to buy her a thank you present.

"Like always. It kind of sucked because, like, I was enough for her to run to when she needed someone, but other than that..." Jamie nodded and looked over at me, a small smile on his face in spite of it all. "You know, Aubrey, you're really easy to talk to..."

I smiled and bit my lip. "I've been told that now and again. And you know, she's pretty stupid. Sure, maybe Tommy has the whole 'mystery boy' appeal, but he just seems...I don't even know. Just...too..." I tried to think of what I thought Tommy was, but the right words weren't coming.

"Something?" Jamie smirked and stopped, taking a seat on a bench, seeing as how we'd somehow landed ourselves in a park.

I chuckled and nodded my head. "Yeah. I don't know what, but you're far, far less...um...whatever that something is...than him," I stuck my tongue out. "And if I were Jude, I would have made Tommy the one who was always on the outside looking in."

With a laugh, Jamie got comfortable on the bench. "You barely know me...and you haven't met Tommy, so, how do you know you'd choose me?" he asked, biting his lip and holding his index finger out. "Not to sound ungrateful or whatever."

I shook my head. "No, it's okay. I don't know..." I shrugged a shoulder and kept myself a bit away from him, so he didn't get the wrong idea. "I've always had this really good people sense. Not to brag or anything. But like, I can always seem to tell by a short conversation with someone, or sometimes just by looking at them and how they carry themselves, if we'd mix well. Definitely don't get that from Tommy Q..."

He seemed dumbfounded. "But you do from me?" he asked, his eyes filled with more shock than I'd seen on anyone in ages.

I nodded and smiled. "I wouldn't be here if I didn't..."

He had a smug smirk on his face as he chewed on his lower lip. "What do you know, I beat the great Tommy Quincy for once..." he laughed, and the laugh sounded as though the whole situation was surreal to him.

I had been about to say something in response when a car went by, driving unnecessarily fast, and went through a puddle of slush, sending the contents up and flying at Jamie and I. All the slush avoided our faces and hair, but our coats and pants were soaking wet, and I looked at him, jaw agape, holding back a laugh at how stupid the whole situation was. "Well, um..."

He looked both amused and a bit upset, but he saw the look on my face and smiled a bit more. "Back to my place and away from crazy speeding drivers who like to think of puddles as ways to assault a pair of innocent bystanders?" he asked.

I laughed and stood up. "We can watch a movie or something safe," I said, watching as he nodded.

The walk back to Jamie's place was sort of silent. But my thoughts were kind of filled with the fact that this had turned from me bing a charity case, to a sort of forced date. But we were both having fun, or at least it felt that way. so it was definitely a good thing. I changed into something dry downstairs (my pajamas, since they were on the top of the suitcase), while he did the same in the bathroom upstairs, and after noticing that his nana was asleep in her recliner, I went silently up to wait for him in the den while he finished getting dressed.

While I waited, I glanced at the shelf which housed his movie collection, noting that not only did he have normal dorky guy movies, like Star Wars and all the stuff I fought with my brother not to watch, but he had a couple classics, too. And some gore movies, which was good, because those were my favorite type. I grabbed one of the Saw movies, and waited for him to come back into the room. When I saw him, I smirked at the fact that we'd both changed into our pajamas. "It's a pajama party!" I joked, watching as he grinned to match mine. "Let's watch this."

Nodding, smirking and taking the DVD from my hand, Jamie put it into the DVD player and turned the TV on. "I have to say, I didn't think you were going to like any of the movies I had here..."

I shrugged and smiled a bit more. "Gore is my thing..." I said, taking a seat on the couch and watching as he sat a couple of feet away. Had I been any bolder, I would have leaned against him, but for one, I didn't want to come off as easy, and for two, even though I was all but wearing a sign on my head that said I thought he was amazing, he hadn't really given me any indication as to whether he felt the same or not. But no sooner had I thought that, than I saw him kind of pat the couch beside him. Didn't need to tell me twice. Grinning like an idiot, I moved closer to him, biting my lip when his arm found it's way around my shoulders.

And apparently, after that, somewhere between the opening credits and finding out that Dr. Gordon and Adam were locked in a bathroom for the extent of the movie, the bus trip and events of the rest of the day caught up to me, and I dozed off in the crook of Jamie's arm.


	4. Six Feet Under the Stars

"James!" I heard coming from the staircase. I knew I should have gotten Jamie up but I didn't really want to. Not yet. "James, Sadie Harrison is at the door!"

Suddenly, the desire not to wake Jamie up was replaced with shock and concern, and my eyes widened when I realized what had been said. Sadie was at the door? How long had we been asleep? All night, I noted, as I could see sunlight streaming in through the window and lighting the whole room up. The whole previous day came flashing back to me, and I groaned heavily. I'd slept the whole night on Jamie's couch? With Jamie? There was no way that anyone would believe that it was as innocent as it was, either. But...what really mattered was that Jamie and I knew...right? I lifted my head and looked over at Jamie, seeing him still sleeping and poked him in the side. "Jamie?"

With a groan and a stretch, Jamie's brown eyes opened and he looked at me. "Oh...um...hi, Aubrey. Oh. Oh man. Did we sleep all night?" he asked as he noted the sun streaming in through the window and squinted.

I chuckled and nodded a little. "And now your nana is calling from downstairs...Sadie's at the door..." I said, getting up and rifling through my bags for some clothes, though my hair looked like someone had run over it with a lawnmower, and I realized then that there was no way to cover this up.

Jamie laughed and shook his head. "Well isn't this great. I'm probably going to get lectured for preying on her friend who's new in town and God knows a Sadie Harrison lecture is about as fun as dental surgery..." he rolled his eyes.

I smirked at the comparison and shook my head no. "Jamie, I won't let her kill you, okay? You basically saved me from freezing to death, because she forgot to leave me keys, and you showed me a really, really good time, so she has no right to be mad," I stood and grabbed some of my bags. "And if I know Sadie, which I do, I can make her way less mad," I said, grabbing a piece of paper from the front of my bag and taking a second to write my cell number down, setting it on the table.

He smiled again and ran a hand through his mess of hair, straightening it out a little. "I save your life, you save mine?" he asked with a huge grin on his face.

I laughed and nodded in agreement. "Something like that. We can be like the modern day Superman and Wonder Woman. Only we're far better looking..." I shoved him with my shoulder and watched as he picked up a couple of my bags, too.

He laughed in response to my joke and nodded. "Well, we'll have to do this again sometime, though. Well, I mean, not the whole 'you almost freezing to death' part or the 'getting hit by slush courtesy of a speeding car' thing, but the rest of it..." he blushed. And God was it ever precious. "If you want to, anyway."

"Definitely," I told him, watching as his grin grew exponentially. "Maybe I can have you over to the Harrison's on a night when they're all at G Major."

He smirked. "So, basically, any night?"

"Yeah, basically..." I started down the stairs, him close behind. "I can, like, cook you dinner and we can rent a couple movies and relax..." I offered, watching as he nodded. I turned my head to where Sadie stood in the doorway, a suspicious look on her face, which I combated with a foreboding one. "Thanks for the stew last night, Nana Andrews..." I told her with a smile, putting my bags down to shake her hand.

She smiled back and nodded her head. "You're welcome here anytime, just like the Harrison girls, Aubrey," she took my hand and put her other hand on my upper arm.

"Thank you," I smiled, then looked over at Sadie. "Shall we? I'm dying to see what the inside of the Harrison house looks like..." I turned and looked at Jamie. "Call me anytime, Jamie. I left my cell number on the table upstairs..." I watched him nod and followed Sadie out the door, closing it behind me.

She gave me that same look again, and I rolled my eyes, listening to what she had to say. "I have to say, I didn't expect to find you in your pajamas at Jamie Andrews' house..." she said, breaking out into a smirk. "I have to know. Did you?"

I scoffed, though I hadn't expected any less from Sadie. "No. We didn't!" I said as I dragged my suitcase up the front walk to Sadie's house. "You didn't leave a key, so Jamie asked me over for supper and let me stay until you came home. We kind of hung out and talked. Just so happens we fell asleep watching a movie..." I smirked. I wouldn't tell her that I fell asleep leaned against him.

With a smirk still on her face, Sadie grabbed a key from her pocket. "I had this made for you yesterday, I just forgot about it, though I guess, for your sake, that's a good thing..." she winked. "However," she waited to open the door, turning and looking at me. "You have to...be really careful talking about this around Jude because...she gets really jealous when someone dates one of her exes..."

I raised an eyebrow and looked over at Jamie's house. "Even Jamie? I mean, he told me about their short lived not-even-relationships, and the way I see it, Jude...has no right to get mad, there..." I shrugged and watched Sadie nod. "Possessive, much?"

Sadie tilted her head and shrugged a shoulder. "Well, she and Jamie aren't on the best terms, so I mean, she might be upset that he'll talk to you and probably not her...though I don't entirely blame him for it," she told me as she opened the door. "Doesn't matter. Just be careful..."

"Where's Jude right now, anyway? I mean, does she know that I stayed at Jamie's?" I asked, looking around and noticing that there was no sign of Jude anywhere.

Sadie chuckled and shook her head. "You lucked out, my friend," she said as she set my bags by the door. "I think she stayed at Tommy's last night," she backed up a couple steps and looked around. "And now, Aubrey, welcome home..."

I looked around at the modest front hall and the less-than-modest living room with a plasma TV and all the accessories, and from there I could see the kitchen and an open door leading to a bathroom. Sadie started talking about a grand tour, and leading me around the house, but I wasn't really even paying attention. All I could think of was that the great Jude Harrison would hate me if she found out that I'd spent an innocent night talking to her former lover and former best friend who she had no interest in whatsoever. So because of the great time I'd had yesterday, I'd placed myself in the midst of a war zone, if I was found out. The question here was, did I think Jamie was worth it.

And the answer was a resounding yes.

After showing me around the house, Sadie and I finally got to the guest room, which was to be my room, and started unpacking my clothes into the dresser. "So, tell me one thing."

I turned and looked at her, expecting a question about Jamie. "Tell you one thing? Okay. I'm deathly afraid of clowns to the point where my parents could never take me to the circus when I was little..." I said, noting the look that she was giving me. "Not enough?" I quipped. "Okay then...I was in a house fire when I was ten and a firefighter had to chop down a wall to get me out..."

"Really?" she raised an eyebrow and looked back to my bag, pulling out the formerly soaking wet jeans I'd been wearing the previous day. "What, exactly, happened at Jamie's?" she asked, holding them up and showing that a part of them were bleached from the salt on the ground.

I sighed at the fact that I'd have to buy a new pair of jeans, considering those had been my favorites. But that was probably the only bad thing to come out of that night, so I had no right to complain. "Well," I raised a shoulder in a shrug. "Like I said, I was mere seconds from becoming solid ice on the front porch, and Jamie hollered over from his front yard and asked me if I was a stalker. I said no, he invited me in, I met his nana, we ate supper, he showed me around his place, we went for a walk, watched a movie and fell asleep," I told her. "Nothing scandalous or anything."

"Scandal? Jamie? Ha, yeah, I didn't expect that anyway..." Sadie quipped. "Jamie is about as clean cut as the day is long..."

I grinned a little. A clean cut nice guy? Just what I needed to combat the sleazes and idiots that I dated in Iowa. Not that Jamie and I were going to date or anything...but if we did? I totally wouldn't object to it. I grabbed a couple of shirts from the bag, folded them and put them away. "Scandal free is good."

"Do you like him?" Sadie asked me, a smirk coming across her face as she pulled a skirt from my suitcase. "I'm borrowing this, by the way, it's perfect for work."

I smirked and nodded at her about the skirt...and about Jamie. "Yeah..." I bit my lip. "I mean, like, I don't know him well, but he made what was supposed to be a really, really bad night...into what was possibly the best night ever..." I smiled, thinking of the time we spent on the couch in his den, and how...good it felt to be nuzzled against him.

Continuing to dig through my things, Sadie's grin grew and her lips pursed a bit. "Never took you for the type to go for nerds," she paused, looking at the blouse that went with the skirt that she'd seen. "Borrowing this too. I'm so glad you're my size."

I smiled a bit more when she mentioned 'nerds,' and shrugged my shoulders. "Jamie's sweet. Trustworthy. I like that he...I don't know. I just like him. He's really, really nice. And gorgeous..."

Sadie stifled a laugh. "Cute?" she stared at me like I had two heads. "To each their own, I guess," she stuck her tongue out. "Like I said...just be careful about Jude."

"Be careful about Jude what?" I heard coming from the door.

Sadie and I both turned to see Jude standing there with a smile on her face, and I bit my lip, trying to think on my feet about something, but thankfully, Sadie had me covered. "When you say you can cook? She has to be careful because I seem to remember a certain blonde rock star giving me food poisoning and making me mess a week or so of work."

Jude scoffed a little and took a couple steps into the room. "She's never going to let me live that one down," she said, giving me an up and down look and extending her hand. "Jude Harrison," she introduced herself.

I smiled thankfully at Sadie, then looked over at Jude, extending my hand, too. "Aubrey McDermott. Nice to meet you. And don't worry, I give everyone's cooking a fair shot. I cook myself, so...yeah," I shrugged.

"So, you can alternate with Kwest!" Jude said excitedly, then looked at Sadie. "Speaking of, he's gonna be running late. And I'm not here long, I just wanted to drop in and meet my new roommate..." she said with a smile in my direction. "Tommy's picking me up and we're going to Vancouver for the week to this couples spa Darius recommended and I have to go pack..."

Sadie smirked. "Oh to be famous. All right. Well then go ahead and pack and come get us when you leave and we can walk you to the car and stuff..." she told Jude, who smiled and headed out of the room, toward her room.

Biting my lip, I smirked. A whole week with Jude out in Vancouver, half of a country's length away? Meaning I could as much time with Jamie as I wanted this week, without worry of repercussion. Sadie gave me a smirk, because it seemed she knew what I was thinking, and nodded her head. What a way to start my time in Toronto. Now all I needed was a job.


	5. Down

Walking up to the front door of the restaurant, I sighed a little. It was either work a minimum wage job as a waitress, which Sadie insisted wasn't becoming of me, or wait a million years of mooching off of Jude, Sadie and Kwest until I found something 'fitting.' And while I agreed that waiting tables wasn't exactly my pace, I didn't like to feel like dead weight. Especially not with someone who had been as nice to me as Sadie Harrison had. So I looked at the horridly ugly dress I was wearing and tied my hair back, opening the door and preparing to start my first day, first shift of hell. And just as I'd expected, there was really no learning curve. It was either you're a fast learner or you're out of luck. Fortunately for me, I was the fastest learner I knew.

What didn't contribute too much to that situation, however, was the fact that customers had no patience for a person still learning the ropes, and the training system was horrible. By the end of my shift, I'd messed up three orders so far, had about four sodas and one hot cup of coffee spilled on me, and I was having the hardest time keeping a smile on my face. It was five minutes before my shift was over, however, when I heard the door ring open...and smirked when I saw Jamie walking through the door. I wondered if he'd found out that I worked here, but even so, it didn't matter. I walked up to his table and smiled at him. "Any drinks or appetizers?" I asked subtly, seeing as how he was the only customer not being waited on yet.

He looked up from the menu and grinned at me. "Just a Sprite and some chili fries, for now..." he said, and I scribbled the order down, walked over to put the paper up and then back to sit with Jamie. He looked up from the table at me. "You know, I didn't take you for the type to wait tables..." he said with a slight shrug and a smile as he leaned back in the seat. "Hey, aren't you going to get in trouble for socializing on the job?" he asked me.

I smirked back at him and shrugged, moving from the seat and watching as he reached across the table. "Well, if you don't want me here..." I stuck my tongue out, then sat back down. "Thought maybe that was the case..." I sat back down and crossed my arms, grinning smugly across the table. "My shift is up in like two minutes, so I thought I'd sit down and socialize with my favorite record producer while his chili fries were cooking..." I stuck my tongue out.

"Darius is here?" he looked over his shoulder, then around the rest of the restaurant, and then back at me with a smile. "I know you're nothing but a G Major groupie..."

I shoved him in the arm and looked over at the table when the bell went off, signifying that his food was done. "Hold that thought," I stood and went to get his food and brought it over to him, then went over to the clock to sign out. Making my way back over to Jamie's table, I sat back down. "So, I was thinking..."

"I hear that's dangerous..." one side of his mouth went up into a grin.

I scoffed and made a face at him, reaching over to his plate and grabbing a fry. "And here I was about to invite you to a nice supper and movie at Sadie's tonight, since Jude is in Vancouver, but if you're gonna be like that..." I teased, biting into the fry I stole and getting up from my seat.

I saw, though, from the corner of my eye that he was grinning. "See you at seven?" he eyed me hopefully.

"I'll be waiting..." I looked over my shoulder at him, then left the restaurant, taking my phone out and trying to ready myself to plead with Sadie to go with Kwest to a movie or something tonight. Dialing Sadie, I prayed for a positive answer so that Jamie and I didn't have to deal with the potential of it being a double date. Not that I didn't want to double date with Sadie and Kwest, but dealing with the mushy wushy, lovey dovey crap might make Jamie feel pressured.

"Hello?" Sadie sounded like she was bored, and I wondered if G Major had her working as a glorified desk jockey again.

"I take it this is a bad time to ask if you and Kwest can go out to a movie or something tonight?" I bit my lip and prayed to any type of deity governing toe world that I could at least have a couple of hours along with Jamie. "Jamie's coming over for dinner tonight and..."

"You're in luck," she seemed exasperated. "Kwest is gonna be working with Paegan Smith's stuff until about eleven, and I rode in with him today...so you've got the place all to yourselves until eleven thirty."

Stuck at G Major until eleven thirty? God that had to suck. "Ouch..." I bit my lip. "If you want I can take your car and come pick you up..." I offered, though I seriously hoped that she'd say no. I really wanted this time alone with Jamie.

"It's okay. Just save us some of whatever you're cooking, all right?" I heard a smile in her voice. "And call me if I'm not home when it's over..."

I laughed a little. "Will do, mistress Sadie..." I said, closing my phone and hailing a cab to go back home. I had a lot of getting ready to do.

Getting ready for a date, which may not have even been a date, had never been so horrifying in my life. I didn't even know what type of clothes to wear, what Jamie would like the most for food, what movies to rent, though I'd settled on a couple of gore flicks, that way we could pick and choose between them. With a couple minutes to spare, I straightened my shirt and put the giant pan of fried chicken and the pot of mashed potato on the table on the back porch, along with a couple plates and cups, straightened my shirt and sat on the couch, waiting for the doorbell to ring.

At a couple minutes past seven, I heard the ring of the doorbell and leapt from my seat, biting my lip and hurrying to the door. Pulling it open slowly, I smirked when I saw Jamie. "Fashionably late, eh?"

"Oh yes. Because I'm the most fashionable person you know..." he said, stepping into the house when I got out of the way. "You...on the other hand..." he looked at me like I was the only person on the planet. "Look amazing..."

I looked down at myself, jeans and a t-shirt...the basics, so I don't know why he thought I looked so good. I looked at him and smiled a bit more. "Thanks..." I said, taking him in. It honestly didn't matter what he wore, though. He still looked amazing. "You do too. I...have dinner sitting on the back porch, if you're hungry," I told him, suddenly feeling kind of shy. I hadn't dated for three years, since my last boyfriend back in Iowa, and I was afraid that I was out of practice.

He took his coat off and put it on a chair by the door. "Okay. What did you make?" he asked, though I could tell, seeing as how he was a guy, that he didn't much care what I'd made to eat.

"Fried chicken and mashed—" I paused and looked out the door to see that a stray, neighborhood dog had gotten into my supper for Jamie and I, and it was totally gone, strewn across the back porch. My jaw hit the floor. "—dog food..." I finished, closing my eyes and letting my head fall backward.

Jamie reached a hand out and put it on my arm. "So, I should call out for Chinese, then?" he asked, and when I looked at him, I saw a calm, supportive smile on his face. "Anything particular you want?"

With a laugh, I nodded my head and sighed. "Order your favorites. I'm not picky. And I'll pay. I was the one who asked you over, anyway. And we'll end up feeding Kwest and Sadie, too..." I said, going over to my purse and taking out some money. Wasn't very smart of me to leave the food on the porch in the first place. Though I didn't suspect that in the short amount of time that I'd been inside, an animal would get into it. Just my luck. I seriously hoped that this didn't set the tone for the rest of the night.

Jamie walked up behind me and put a hand on my shoulder, a grin on his face. "You know, the first time I went out with Jude? Everything in the world went wrong. We went out for burgers and when we went to the movies afterward, I fell down the stairs and broke my arm..." he chuckled and watched as I turned to look at him again. "And the next day? Not only was my arm broken? But both Jude and I ended up with food poisoning from undercooked, rotten burgers," he added with another chuckle.

I chuckled, too. "So, basically, no matter what happens tonight, so long as someone doesn't end up in the hospital, it should be a successful date?" I asked, clinging to the fact that in Jamie's description, he'd used the word date, meaning that this may have been a date between the two of us. "Thanks for that..." I turned toward him and looked up the four inches between my eyes and his.

"I think it would take a lot for you to fail here..." he smiled softly.

I returned his smile and kind of looked at him for a second. Hard for me to fail? Well, he didn't know me too well yet, so he had that on his side. However, I couldn't help but notice, standing in front of him the way I was, that he had the kindest eyes I had ever seen. I felt like I could trust him, just by looking at his face and it really was unlike anything I'd ever seen before. Had I looked for any longer, I would have kissed him, though, and I wasn't sure if I wanted to take it there yet, so I turned and looked at the couch. "So, while we're waiting, want to choose between the movies I picked for us?" I asked him with a shy smile.

He followed behind me, taking a seat beside me on the couch, just as close as we'd been that night at his place. "Sure. What are the choices?" he asked, grabbing the DVD cases from the table. "The Resident Evil trilogy or the Underworld movies..." he smirked. "Hot chick killing zombies or hot vampire chick...well, I'll go with Resident Evil, seeing as how you seem more of a Resident Evil girl to me..."

Smiling and putting the DVD in, I made my way back to the couch and sat close to him again, feeling his arm wrap around my shoulders. My smile widened even more and I leaned against him, nestling myself into the crook of his arm as I had been the other night. I'd liked guys before, lots of them, obviously, but...no one quite as much, quite as fast as Jamie Andrews.

The credits started opening rolling, and I turned and looked at him. Why not live in the moment? I had wanted to kiss him since the first time I talked to him, and we were on a date. Didn't people kiss on dates? I watched as his attention turned toward me, and I smirked, biting my lip and showing him with my eyes what I wanted. His lips curled into a grin, and right then, I realized that I needed his lips against mine, right this second. I moved in a little closer, and when we were seconds from kissing, when the doorbell rang. I felt my body sink and my head dropped back.

Jamie sighed a little and looked at the door. "That's probably supper..."

I nodded and got up, taking my money from my pocket. I only wanted to kiss him. Was that so wrong? Clearly the Chinese food delivery guy thought so.


End file.
